This invention relates to a plant for the pressure gasification of fine-particle fuels wherein the fine-particle fuel in a pressure tank having a level controller is fed to the reactor together with a vehicle gas through a conduit; the fuel being fed by a fuel-feed conduit while a gasification agent is fed by another conduit in a predetermined volumetric ratio according to the amount of fuel supplied.
It is desirable to construct a gasification plant of this type for continuous operation. This includes continuous operation without any interruption due to changeover operations. The plant should include facilities to determine the volume of gas produced by the gasification process per unit of time. This volume of gas should be adjustable from a low value to a maximum value. The same is true in regard to the slag or other mass residue resulting from the gasification of fine-particle fuel in the reactor. The volume of gasification agent introduced into the reactor per unit of time should be at a predetermined volumetric ratio to the mass of fine-particle fuel introduced simultaneously into a reactor. The volume of gas corresponding to that ratio should be obtained automatically.
The system of conduits for the fuel and gas should contain interlocks to prevent only fine-particle fuel or only the gasification agent from entering into the reactor. The reactor for the gasification process may be of any well-known type, specifically, for example, a slag bath generator which includes a vessel with nozzles dispersed about the lower peripheral portion of a vertical reactor vessel for injecting a mixture of fine-particle coal and vehicle gas toward the bottom of the reactor shaft where a layer of slag is maintained by a slag overflow arranged centrally within the reactor shaft to discharge slag as it is continuously formed. A slag bath generator of this type is shown in copending application Ser. No. 684,112, assigned to the same Assignee as the present invention. As disclosed in this copending application, the slag bath generator is operated to gasify the coal at a temperature between 1500.degree. C. and 2200.degree. C. Under normal operating conditions, a pressure of 25 atmospheres is maintained in the reactor shaft. Other details concerning the gasification process for pulverulent or fine-grain ash containing coal used as a fuel as disclosed in this copending application are exemplary of the operation of a slag bath generator which is the preferred form of the reactor for control by the control system of the present invention.